The Sun-god and the Astrological

by Liz Greene

The Centre for Psychological Astrology CPA offers all six issues of the journal "Apollon" for free. Visit www.cpalondon.com to download the PDF files.

In this article, Liz Greene sets her gaze on
the Sun and the solar god Apollo. She writes in her sparkling, lucid
style about the main mythic functions of Apollo, namely cosmocrator,
prophet, breaker of family curses, healer, and culture-bringer,
and the relevance of these to understanding the astrological Sun.

"What is a poet? He is a man of religious experience
whose creative gift enables him to communicate spiritual truths
to men. His poetry can bring deliverance from spiritual death, bringing
his hearers to a new knowledge of their divine Creator, who gave
him this special power. In this way souls that have been disordered
can be healed, and the human relation with God may be restored when
it has been impaired...This is the fruit and indeed the purpose
of music and poetry, direct gifts from God to mankind."

Elizabeth Henry, Orpheus and His
Lute

Myth and astrology have always been handmaidens,
for both are symbolic expressions of the human perception of the
cosmos. From Babylonian times onward, the planets, luminaries and
fixed stars have represented not only forces or agents which influence
or correspond with human affairs, but also characters in stories
which express in imaginal form the archetypal patterns inherent
in life and in the human psyche. The astrologer who is willing to
explore the mythic background of the planets taps a rich resource
of understanding and insight which can amplify and enhance our grasp
of astrological symbolism; and this in turn makes us better astrologers
because we can enter into the client's inner world and communicate
our interpretations in language which touches the heart as well
as the intellect. The importance of myth is nowhere more emphasised
than in our interpretations of the astrological Sun, which is encrusted
in myths from many ages and cultures. Keywords such as "self-expression"
do not really help us; mythic images convey much more of the energy
and intent of the Sun. And none of these mythic images is more relevant
to the expression and meaning of the Sun in the individual horoscope
than the nature and role of the Greek Sun-god Apollo (we have dropped
the final "n" from the name in popular usage, but his correct Greek
name is Apollon). This deity stands behind not only the foundations
of Western culture, but also behind many of the attributes which
Christianity later appropriated and associated with Christ.

Apollo has been called the "gentleman of Olympus",
the most quintessentially Greek of all the Greek gods. In sculptures
and frescoes he is invariably portrayed as beautiful and youthful;
rarely clothed, his body is athletic and of those perfect proportions
so idealised by the Greeks. But the origins of Apollo are far more
ancient than classical Greece; archaeological evidence suggests
that the beginning of his cult predates the Bronze Age. There are
many mysteries surrounding the emergence of this god, not least
his name, about which scholarly arguments still rage. We know of
the origins of his Greek form as early as the 8th century BCE, and
by the 5th century BCE he was associated not only with the Sun but
also with prophecy, healing, the breaking of family curses, and
the bringing of artistic inspiration (especially music and poetry)
to human beings. These multiple attributes make him a difficult
god to comprehend, for initially we may fail to see the connections
between his many different faces. But the more we delve into Apollo's
many functions, the greater is our understanding of what the Sun
really means in the horoscope.

Apollo the light-bringer

Just as the Sun itself was perceived in the
ancient world as the giver of light, Apollo as the representative
of the Sun was perceived as the giver of inner light. "Know thyself"
was the dictum carved in stone at his shrine at Delphi, and this
emphasises the importance of Apollo as a symbol of consciousness.
The god was not understood as the physical Sun in the heavens; he
was the carrier of the Sun, bearing it from East to West each day
in his golden chariot. The physical Sun was remote and untouchable;
it was the One, the essence of life itself, impossible to approach
or fully comprehend. Apollo's human form tells us he is a reflection
of something within the human psyche - a vessel or carrier for the
ineffable. It is not surprising that Pythagoras and Plato both favoured
Apollo, for philosophy in its most profound sense - the love of
wisdom - is related to this process of acquiring consciousness in
order to reconnect with what Plato called the "eternal realities".
Apollo's role as breaker of family curses and slayer of the darkness
was pre-eminent, and it was to him that those tormented by guilt
from the past turned. In myth, his conflicts with female chthonic
underworld deities such as the giant serpent Python and the terrible
Erinyes or "Furies" mark him as the champion of that which is free
over that which is bound by the forces of fate and ancestral compulsion.
Yet although he is the conqueror of these forces, he also incorporates
them into his worship; the Python becomes one of his chief symbols,
not only in its serpent form in Greco-Roman iconography, but also
through the priestess called Pythoness who communicated the god's
oracle. These chthonic mother-deities were also honoured at Delphi
through the presence of the omphalos or navel-stone, the centre
of the earth, where the light of the Sun incarnated on earth. On
coins issued at Delphi we may see the image of the omphalos or navel-stone
as a point at the centre of a circle; the circle was associated
with Apollo because of the great round of the Sun through the heavens,
and because the circle is without beginning and without end and
therefore suggests divinity and eternity. While there is no direct
documentary evidence to suggest that the use of this image - the
point in the circle - later gave rise to our astrological glyph
for the Sun, first used during the Renaissance, the connection is
impossible to ignore.

What does this role of light-bringer imply
in terms of how we interpret the Sun in the horoscope? First of
all it suggests that the symbol of Apollo describes some fundamental
centrality within us - a core identity or sense of personal destiny
which arises from consciousness of ourselves as individuals, and
which has the power to dispel the compulsions which arise from one's
childhood and family background. The Greek "family curse" is a vivid
description of unresolved unconscious conflicts which wend their
way from generation to generation, eventually arriving on the psychic
doorstep of the "identified patient" (as he or she is known in family
therapy) who acts out the burden of this unconscious inheritance
through physical or psychological illness. Anyone who has experienced
the power of compulsions - whether for drugs, alcohol, food, or
through destructive or self-destructive behaviour - will know how
impossible it is to reason these away, and often it is only through
a prolonged and honest exploration of trapped feelings from the
past that any release can come. The therapeutic process is thus
an Apollonian process, not because it is intellectual, but because
it is aimed at increasing consciousness and bringing light into
the darkness. That which is kept in the dark cannot change or grow.
Non-verbal therapies can also achieve this goal; Apollo is not biased
toward any special school of psychological thought, as long as the
process serves the growing sense of an inner self. The Sun in the
horoscope is thus an image of something within us which is capable
of forming a central and indestructible identity around which the
horoscope revolves - an ego which can contain and perhaps even transform
the various conflicts and imbalances which every horoscope possesses.
Such conflicts and imbalances, if exacerbated by early difficulties
without any conscious light to illuminate their origins and nature,
can result in great suffering.

Apollo the cosmocrator

Apollo is also the cosmocrator, the centre
around whom the solar system revolves. In this role he is often
portrayed in ancient art holding or wearing the zodiac wheel, for
the zodiac is a representation of the ecliptic - the apparent path
of the Sun around the earth - in imaginal form, reflecting a cycle
of development which is embodied in the seasons and expressed also
in the multi-levelled cycles of an individual life. (See images
on inside front cover and overleaf.) It is worth noting that the
zodiac is a Greek invention, and coincides in time with the growing
power of the cult of Apollo in the 5th century BCE. Apollo and the
astrology which we have inherited from the Greeks are deeply linked,
and both reflect the same essential perception of an orderly cosmos.
The orderly motion of the cosmos depends on Apollo as bearer of
the purpose and intelligence of the divine light of the Sun, and
it is his reasoning principle that keeps the planets in their courses.
Here again we can gain a lot of insight into what function the Sun
serves in the horoscope, for this centrality puts the individual
at the centre of his or her life, and allows the other factors in
birth chart to relate to each other in harmony. The orderly motion
of the cosmos was understood as the Music of the Spheres, and here
the god of music and the god as cosmocrator overlap and represent
a fundamental pattern in life which is both orderly and beautiful.
Every birth chart might be seen in this way, regardless of how many
hard aspects or planets in detriment or fall one might find; and
perhaps we might say that it is the ability to express the Sun which
makes it possible to unlock harmonious possibilities, rather than
the nature of planetary aspects themselves. In other words, a Mars-Saturn
square or a Moon-Pluto opposition may generate conflict, but they
are truly destructive only when there is no central core from which
the individual can relate to and balance the needs of these planets.
The Sun is the great reconciler of internal planetary conflicts,
allowing them to work for rather than against life. Once again,
a sense of self is the glue which binds the chart together and allows
us to express and mediate it rather than be controlled by it.

Apollo the artist

Apollo is a culture-bringer who inspires human
beings to creative expression through the agency of the Muses. This
group of feminine figures each represents one of the arts - and
it is interesting to see just what the Greeks considered an art.
Chief among the Muses was Calliope, the Muse of music, which is
also one of the gifts of Apollo himself; hence the lyre with which
he is often shown in ancient sculptures and frescoes. Urania is
the Muse of astrology, or, to be more precise, of astrologia, which
was the combination of astrology and what we would now call astronomy.
From the perspective of this mythic backdrop astrology was not perceived
as a science in the sense we would now use the term, but rather,
as an art; and inspiration by the Muse was deemed necessary in order
to tap its wisdom. The Muses were variously considered Apollo's
companions, lovers, or daughters; all three versions exist in myth.
But it is clear that, whatever relationship they hold with him,
they are expressions of his power to touch and inspire human beings
through the creative imagination.

We should therefore not be surprised at the
link between the astrological Sun and the field of human creative
expression, represented by the 5th house of the horoscope. The god
provides the inspiration, but his Muses embody him in accessible
form and serve as bridges between the god and the human imagination.
In Gustave Moreau's magnificent painting of Apollo and the Muses,
the god is shown sending the Muses forth to educate and inspire
humankind. (See opposite.) Apollo's role is thus as educator, a
word which comes from a Greek root meaning "to lead forth". This
is Plato's idea of education - eliciting a response from the soul
which reminds us of the higher spheres from which we have come.
Art as education is rather different from art as entertainment,
or art as political message. The solar dimension of artistic expression
is a highly individual business, springing from deep within oneself
and reflecting one's own special connection with the source of life.
It is not a collective thing, although inspirational creative work
may touch the feelings of the collective if one is sufficiently
open to the larger psyche. But its source is not the collective;
it is the individual Sun, the individual essence. The art of the
astrological Sun may not necessarily be in a form recognisable as
art; it may be embodied in the way one lives one's life. As a reflection
of the role of consciousness in a person's life, this solar link
with inspiration suggests that, wherever the Sun is placed in the
chart, this is where we may experience a sense of connection with
the divine through finding some vehicle or medium through which
we can express that which is most inspiring to our own souls. Here
we can see the connection between the Sun and vocation, whether
that vocation is financially remunerative or something with which
we are preoccupied alone in our private hours. It also suggests
that everyone has a "vocation" in the deepest sense - even if it
is not viable as a money-earning occupation in the world. But a
sense of vocation cannot occur unless the individual is open to
that inner inspiration, and willing to give loyalty to his or her
individual values and vision.

Apollo the prophet

Prophecy is not something we ordinarily associate
with the Sun. We tend to think of prophecy in connection with psychism,
although psychism is related to a blurring of individual boundaries
and a capacity to enter into the larger life of the cosmos (or the
life of another human being) and feel what is occurring there. Prophecy,
as it was expressed through Apollo's oracles, is something quite
different. Apollo's was called Double-Tongued because his oracles
were so perplexing; but what they expressed was a basic scheme or
design, which could be interpreted (and usually was) from a purely
personal point of view. Then the oracle generally went wrong, and
we have many myths describing situations where the hero or heroine
tries to cheat the oracle, or interprets it wrongly with disastrous
results.

In other words, the message of the oracle was
not "psychic", but revealed in a flash the essential pattern underpinning
the individual's life, or highlighted the bare bones of a chapter
in that life. We are really looking at what we mean by destiny,
rather than "fate" in the compulsive sense, and in this respect
Apollo's prophecies are indeed related to the astrological Sun.
When we glimpse an inner design or destiny, it gives our lives meaning
and gives us something to live for; and we can get insight into
that design if we look at the placement of the Sun in the birth
chart by house, sign and aspect. Here is our future, the person
we are potentially capable of becoming and deeply wish and need
to become, if we are to feel our lives have some reason other than
eating, reproducing, and dying. We may misinterpret the flash of
meaning which the Sun gives, depending on our age, circumstances,
and emotional needs and conflicts. But the core story of the individual's
destiny is already known somewhere inside, and this is perhaps why
the Sun is so closely connected with vocation, one's "calling",
or, as Howard Sasportas put it, "a call from the inner Self". Prophecy
as a glimpse of destiny, and destiny embodied in vocation, reflect
one of Apollo's most profound links with the astrological Sun. It
is relevant that the oracle was given by the Pythoness; this suggests
that we cannot directly hear the wisdom the Sun contains except
through our feelings, bodies, and imagination. Without this mouthpiece
Apollo's knowledge is inaccessible. But unless we actively seek
Apollo's wisdom, the Pythoness is left with nothing to say.

We can also see the relevance of astrology
to Apollo, in the sense that as astrologers we seek to interpret
the inherent pattern, the core story of the individual's life. The
birth chart is a form of oracle, not in the fortune-telling sense
- although this dimension of astrology has always been with us -
but as a means of ascertaining the basic design which is our destiny.
That this design is inner rather than outer is something which psychological
astrology strives to emphasise, although life circumstances tend
to reflect and embody the internal story. And like Apollo's oracle,
the configurations of the birth chart may be misinterpreted, by
the astrologer as well as the client, because one lacks the perspective
to view the whole picture and is focused on a special or immediate
concern.

Apollo the healer

Apollo's role as a physician-healer led to
the rise of many Asclepions or healing centres throughout the ancient
world. Asclepios was said to be the son of Apollo, a facet of the
god incarnated in human flesh, and at all these healing shrines
some monument or structure was always included linking Asclepios
with his divine father. Although there are many mysteries surrounding
just what kind of medicine was practised at these healing centres,
we do know that music played an important part, as did the inspiration
and guidance of dreams. The astrological Sun is therefore an inner
healer, and it may be important for us as astrologers to understand
just what this might mean psychologically.

Sickness in terms of Apollo really means being
cut off from the light of the Sun. The Greeks understood sickness
to be psychic as well as physical, and the means of re-establishing
harmony within the soul lay in music and dream-work - in other words,
a relationship to what we would now call the unconscious. Today
many of us tend to forget how profoundly music affects us, and how
it can generate not only harmony but also disharmony. Music has
become a political as much as a cultural issue these days, and we
are in danger of losing sight of its educational and inspirational
function. But music is the chief instrument of Apollo the healer,
and music was understood to reflect the Music of the Spheres - the
cosmic harmony. Thus sickness is a disharmony of the soul, a break
in the human connection to the order of the larger cosmos; and healing
is a restoration of inner harmony and a reconnection to the source.
The will to live is deeply connected with the Sun in the horoscope,
and the will to live arises from a sense of meaning; and this in
turn arises from a feeling of being connected with something greater
than oneself. The Sun gives us a feeling of being a vessel for something
larger, something higher, and if we can put ourselves in harmony
with it, we can find a meaning in life even if we experience tragedy
and loss. Every physician knows that without the will to live, the
ill patient will die, regardless of the efficacy of physical cures.
In the ancient world the Sun was hyleg, the life-giver, and a loss
of connection with the Sun meant a loss of the will to live.

The harmony suggested by these ancient metaphors
may not mean harmony in one's life in the ordinary sense; no birth
chart is devoid of conflict and neither is any human life. But a
sense of alignment is one of the gifts of expressing the Sun in
the horoscope, and this alignment with a greater pattern - a feeling
of individual destiny and purpose - may lie closer to what was understood
as Apollo's healing. The process of psychotherapy is an obvious
arena today where the individual can reconnect with a sense of being
what he or she is meant to be, freed from the pressures and expectations
of family background and collective unconsciousness. The arts are
perhaps another arena where this sense of reconnection can occur,
provided they are kept free of politicising and not subsumed entirely
in the gratifications of banal entertainment. But such a perspective
is perhaps politically incorrect these days, for the word "elitist"
is forever on the lips of those who do not wish to make the effort
to find the inner connection which the Sun requires of us. To be
an individual is to be alone and elite, as is the Sun-god himself.

When the Sun doesn't shine

Depression, loss of the will to live, feeling
dominated by inner compulsions, too great a dependency on others,
identification with the collective resulting in a sense of not being
real unless others are there to provide a mirror - all these experiences
may result if we do not express the Sun in the horoscope. And expressing
the Sun means making room in one's life for the values and needs
of the Sun-sign, involving oneself actively in the sphere of life
represented by its natal house, and honouring the needs of the planets
which aspect it. When we are cut off from the functions symbolised
by the mythic Apollo, we experience passivity, powerlessness, meaninglessness,
and loss of confidence. We need others to constantly affirm who
we are, and we are frightened of having any individual feeling or
opinion which might isolate us from the collective around us. No
single planet in the birth chart is itself whole, and the Sun too
may be overemphasised at the expense of instinctual needs and at
the expense of others; Apollo is not the only god. But it is perhaps
more common to meet individuals who have too little, rather than
too much, Sun. As astrologers we need to ask ourselves why any individual
should not be able to relate to the Sun in the horoscope. Practising
astrologers have all met the client who displays nothing of the
Sun, and cannot recognise any of the Sun-sign attributes in his

A number of factors may contribute to the inability
or unwillingness to form a strong enough ego. First of these is
the effect of the early environment, which, regardless of internal
chart strengths, may, if it is destructive enough, succeed - for
a time - in blanketing the Sun with a suffocating darkness so that
it cannot shine. Systematic erosion of the child's sense of self
may be part of this; parents who themselves cannot connect with
Apollo's light may resent seeing it in their children, and may do
their best to convince the child that it is the family that matters,
not the individual. Collective pressures may also contribute, especially
in societies where individual expression is tantamount to a criminal
act, as it was under the old Soviet Union regime. But it is questionable
whether a destructive environment can wholly thwart the light of
the Sun if the individual himself or herself is not somehow caught
in an inner conflict. To understand this we need to look at the
aspects to the Sun in the birth chart, and also at the way in which
the Sun "sits" in the chart in relation to the balance of elements.

A chart lacking in the element of fire may
suggest that the individual finds it hard to trust the inspiration
of the Sun, and may see himself or herself as "uncreative" or destined
to serve those who are more creative. This generates an inner conflict
which may be helped by an honest look at over-dominant security
needs or too great a dependency on what others think. A child with
such a chart balance, born into a family which emphasises responsibility
to others, may readily take on the role of caretaker, and may fear
self-expression as an instrument of loneliness and alienation from
the family. Hard aspects to the Sun from planets such as Saturn
and Chiron may also reflect an inner conflict, a deep doubt in one's
worth as an individual which makes it hard to trust solar light.
The Sun may be blocked, or there may be a strenuous overcompensation
which offers no real relief. Such aspects to the Sun may also reflect
issues with the father, who may himself be wounded or unable to
express an individual vision, or who may be too critical, indifferent
or disinterested to provide encouragement for his child's developing
sense of self. The Sun can indeed be expressed however difficult
its aspects, but a compromise may be required between vision and
the reality of one's personal limits. Hard aspects from the Sun
to the outer planets may also suggest a deep conflict between one's
openness to and allegiance to the collective, and one's need to
shine as an individual. Such a conflict also requires a compromise
- a vehicle through which one may express one's own values and identity
and also serve the collective for which one is a kind of mouthpiece.
Everything here depends on balance; or, as we are instructed by
the inscription at Delphi, "Nothing in excess".

House placements may also reflect an inner
conflict between individual self-expression and collective factors;
the Sun in the 8th, 11th, or 12th may suggest, like the Sun aspecting
the outer planets, a deep openness to the collective psyche and
a need to find a medium through which individual vision can be expressed
as a contribution to the collective. The Sun in the 4th or 10th
may reflect a powerful bond to one of the parents, which makes it
hard for the Sun to convey the light of one's own self; rather,
it is a vessel for the unlived life of the parent. There are many
other ways in which inner conflict may be expressed in the chart,
perhaps exacerbated by the early environment, which results in a
loss of the Sun's light. Then we have to work harder to find and
express the light. It should not be thought that a well-aspected
Sun in the sign of its dignity or exaltation means one has no difficulties
in life; too much Sun may be too much of a good thing, and for those
in whom Apollo is thriving, the loss of lunar contact may present
a different but equally painful kind of disconnection. But if we
remember the symbol of the Sun-god as cosmocrator, loss of the Sun's
light is tantamount to loss of a sense of individual meaning, and
no amount of lunar emotional fulfilment can compensate for this.
We may find a reason to go on living even if we are alone. But if
we have no reason to live, then we will try to live through others;
and when they disappoint us or refuse to allow us to continue along
this path, we may then have to cope with the loss of the will to
live which, in ancient times, was healable only through the agency
of Apollo.

The price to be paid

The mythology of Apollo also tells us the price
to be paid if we are to develop the Sun and define ourselves as
individuals. Apollo is a god who stands alone, unmarried and often
rejected by lovers; and he has bad luck with his children, all of
whom come to early violent ends. Orpheus is torn to pieces by Maenads;
Asclepios is struck by Zeus' thunderbolt; Phaeton crashes the solar
chariot and is consumed in flames. Although loved by gods and humans
alike, Apollo has no family and establishes no dynasty. This imagery
should not be taken literally, for expressing the Sun does not necessarily
deny us a family or good relationships with other human beings.
But if we choose to be individuals, we may have to sacrifice the
luxury of living through other human beings, and especially living
through our partners and children, who may strongly resist what
they experience as domination. Thus Apollo is an image of something
within us which is alone and self-contained, and which can shine
only if we are willing to detach sufficiently from others to affirm
an individual centre and meaning. The price of enjoying the Sun's
light is a certain degree of aloneness, although this is rarely
literal in the sense of having no actual companionship. But inwardly,
one cannot ever entirely sink into that state of unconscious fusion
which exists when the ego has never fully formed. Some conflict
with family and collective may be inevitable. However, the ancient
astrological association of the Sun with the heart and with love
suggests that what we often call love may actually be a state of
psychic fusion and dependency; and it may even be that we cannot
truly love another individual as someone separate and worthy of
respect if we are not separate individuals ourselves.

Apollo is of course only one of a family of
gods, and the Sun is only one of a family of planets in the birth
chart. We cannot be entirely alone, for we are part of a larger
system and would be wise not to forget our antecedents and our participation
in the collective in which we live and move and have our being.
But it is not surprising that, even given the nature of the unhappiness
which arises when the Sun does not shine, we still show reluctance
to pay the price for its light. Fear of loneliness is the great
enemy of solar light, and so is fear of envy, which is tantamount
to the same thing; for others' envy hurts deeply because we need
others' love and approval so much. If we are too unsure of ourselves
to risk the disapproval of others, we cannot express the Sun sufficiently.
If we are worried that others will resent us if we produce, or simply
are, something "special", then we must always ensure that we are
ordinary, and may then attack and attempt to destroy others who
dare to express solar light because we are eaten up by envy ourselves.
This archetypal dilemma may be observed not only in myth but also
in history, and in the questionable position of the artist in society.
The artist is recognised as special and is usually glamorised, but
often also attacked and even destroyed by the very people for whom
he or she is the mouthpiece. This is not a political issue, but
rather, an archetypal one, although it has taken political forms
throughout the centuries. One example was Plato, that great adherent
of Apollonian light, who was driven from Syracuse and nearly murdered
when he attempted to restrict theatrical performances to those which
educated rather than those which merely entertained. History as
well as myth provides us with examples of how threatening solar
light can be, and not only when it is itself overly dominant and
expressed in tyrannical forms. For each individual, this archetypal
conflict is relevant, for when we talk about individual creativity,
we are really talking about the definition of an individual essence,
different from that of everyone else, which has its own destiny
and contribution to make to life. And because astrology itself is
under the governance of Apollo, through his role as cosmocrator
and also through his Muse Urania, we as astrologers may be called
upon to take the role of the Sun when we interpret the chart for
the client, shedding light on how the client's inner light may be
encouraged, as well as making clear the reasons why it is not already
shining, and the price to be paid if it does.

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